no, because in a symphany there is an order for the parts. in ITM there isnt.
ITM is like learning a bunch of tunes without relying on music (perhaps in learning, but not in playing), and ultimately learning how to play these tunes with a group of either friends or even strangers and create music. of course, true ITM would be playing by yourself, but thats not the way people do it nowadays as much.
I didn't say you had to keep it all in the same order. But it is like a huge body of work with many different parts. Much of it sounds like variations of other parts, and there are many different rhythms and tempos. And I never suggested it couldn't be shared among friends.
What? Aren't we allowed to argue with you anymore?
I don't think it's like memorising an entire symphony at all. Entire symphonies are obviously far more harmonically and melodically complex. The whole structure of each fragment of melody in a symphony bears little resemblance to the form of an Irish tune. A conductor has to memorise entire symphonies and know what instruments are playing what at any one time. For a conductor, what's happening at any one time is open to a greater range of interpretation than trad in terms of dynamics. You're going to be much more concerned with timbre, texture and volume than anyone would be in a session, or anyone concerned with learning the trad repertoire. An orchestra playing a symphony simply is not like a bunch of people getting together for tunes.
Learning trad for me is a whole different experience from learning classical music, like the difference between learning how to ride a bike and how to drive a car. They're both vehicles of sorts, which allow you to avoid walking, but you have to think about different things. Like with a bike you have to think more about balance, otherwise you fall over. With a car, you have to learn how to use the clutch, otherwise you stall.
Learning trad is a weird hobby for obsessed people. It's like stamp-collecting, only you're collecting tunes. Or it's like being interested in learning the dates of every single monarch that has ruled a country. You're never going to learn them all, but you learn them one at a time. Sometimes they stick and you can remember them easily. Sometimes they flit away annoyingly. Either way, if you tell a lay person that you can do this, they're going to go "so?".. You can tell a non-tradist that you just learnt a new tune, and they'd probably look at you listlessly, thinking "it's great that you've got a hobby, but why would you want to do it?"
In fact, forget the monarch thing, it's like learning origami. Each model you make has a character of its own. For each model you have a series of folds - some are complex, some not. Th model as a whole looks better when it's finished if you've been careful and made sure to crease the paper thoroughly and accurately. You can memorise how to make each thing, or you can use instructions in a book (like sightreading dots). It makes a good party trick and people think you're kinda cool but a bit weird for being good at it. You can socialise with other people who are obsessed with origami. All this skilled arty stuff is similar really from a learning point of view. But symphonies are a different ball game.
hi jack! couldn't get in here for awhile (jeremy?) but was intrigued by your heading: Larnin' ITM is Like....?"
well, i agree. When I get on a new tune it is very encompassing for me as well. My knowledge and experience thus far present themselves to me in a new way when I am in learning mode, and something "symphonic" happens. It is sweet and delicious. But, as you know experience teaches that this euphoria is largely subjective.....
As a metaphor, well, hmmm, yeah, like you say there's no right or wrong interpretation of it, but I think it's a bit of a crap one Jack I think there are better metaphors out there... But hey, it's much more fun to disagree than be boring and just agree.
so, there is some consensus here that ITM is NOT like a symphony.. I DISAGREE>> I HEAR a SUYMPHOy.. Remember Diana Ross and the Motown Jubee joo.. they heard the layers..
Conductors of symphonies have a differnt kind of experience, thats all. Their knowledge is more technical. A single guy or gal with a single instrument commits the same amount of emotion per capita...
Dow, must you always take my allegory so literally? I don’t mean it’s just-like-learning a symphony any more than you mean it‘s like driving a car. (Talk about sucky metaphor) It just occurred to me that it’s like one huge body of work -- all inter-related kind of like a symphony. Of course when I posted this thread I didn’t expect everyone to agree, but we’ll leave the argumentative aspects to you, Dow … ya nut… Brit-Box player… *snicker*
WARNING: It would be advisable that no one use the term; "public performance" anywhere in this thread. Just so it doesn't go off the deep end. *snicker*
ok so the private conductor while preparing his private symphony for a private performance of privately slushed political monies for the benefit of many privatized persons with secluded oceanside resorts privately perched on their personal oceanside lots with no tresspassing signs
Not to mention the fact that origami is done for personal pleasure. And you might go to a club or something and meet up with (and maybe drink with) other people who like origami. The whole point of a syphony is that the orchestra rehearses it for the purpose of....
Aargh sorry gotta go, Beebs has just invited me out for a drink and I can't say no. And that's not me chickening out and saying "you're wrong, bye" - I'm not like that, you know I'm not.
Learning ITM is like engaging in mnemonic excercises that rerout and possibly re-grout neural pathways and muscle memory reactors in synch with flexible but wilfully limited fractal (from mathematically interpreted and proportioned) sound systems, individually processed and produced but validated by a networked community, the emergent consensus of which informs, limits and standardises the output.
it's also like taking a radical political position on lifestyle and cultural living, denying the validity of a consumer-based culture and eschewing the principles of a market economy. It's like espousing a buy-in approach to anarcho-syndicalism, as represented by small self-governing communities that have reject hierarchies, though non-institutionalised and fluid power structures wax and wane within the group from time to time.
.... being in the advanced class after cutting your teeth on Morris Tunes/English Tunes/Old Timey/etc (take your pick). It's a whole order more difficult, but a whole lot more rewarding. It makes you dedicate more of your life to it if you're serious about the music and it changes you. It is also addictive.
learning ITM is like learning to walk, you can't play(walk) but you want to, you have no interest in crawling (scales), when you do manage to walk (play) those first few steps, you do so too fast, and end up falling on your arse.
Plus it's about 10 times more frustrating. What is it about ITM that keeps me going? God only knows.....
This is Dow talking as Beebs. We are getting pissed on a week night and Beebs has to go to work tomorrow and she's stressing. Imagine us hiccuping, playing really cool MP3's from Bridie's collection, and drinking beers.
LOL -- never have to imagine that, for god's sake, it happens too often to have to use the imagination! What are you two going to drunken go on about for our amusement tonight? ;)
I do, sometimes, Brides. Admittedly, mainly it's because Kevin Glackin told me that I should, but also sometimes when I get tired of thinking and need to relax my fingers between tunes. Or when I feel like I need to check my sense of intonation.
Zeens darls (we're playing musical chairs here and commenting on the fact that you're always just *there* on this website. It's great cuz we have someone to talk to when we're being "drunken little darlings"). You know those people who can't play a CD the whole way through? They let one track play for about 2 seconds and then they pounce on it and change the track? That's Beebs.
I dont change tracks all the time Dow! We are listening to the tune Flooded Road to Glenties by Jimmy McHugh, may in fact be the best tune ever written! Sorry about the hijack! Dow is going to post it tomorrow...Kevin G told me to do that as well - said I needed to do it (years ago) but I just cant really be bothered doing scales, its enough effort just to learn tunes.
Thought I'd check my e-mail on the way to the hot tub, and then of course I had to check here...
(Guess I overdid the concentrating on the new tunes last night -- learning The Curlew and Jug of Punch -- my neck hurts this morning! Should've done more scales.
You guys aren't near drunk as usual, there's not near as many bits of punctuation as when you're really lit. Heh.
Okay, I'm going to go get some breakfast and pop into the hot tub. Then I have to come back down and motor through a bodice on a dress for a darling little dancer...she's so excited about her first solo dress!
I can see beebs starting to beat herself up here in a minute 8>)
I play scales! I even admit it. Not just to check intonation and all that sort of technical thing ... when I'm tired and hassled and I know it will be no more than three semi-quavers before I get interrupted, playing scales and technical exercises keeps me at least a little bit in touch with the fiddle even if I'm prevented from getting into the tunes.
Back home now. Zina, for a change, I was the bad influence tonight, not Beebs. She actually said at one point (and Conan will find this hilarious and know exactly what I'm talking about) "No I'm not having any more beer because you know me I'll just want more", so I bought her another pint. And predictably she then wanted to stop at the bottle shop on the way home
Well otherwise I woulda had to go straight home, and she really doesn't take much persuading! Actually we were having a meeting tonight (ooh sorry Jack btw to hijack) about organising sponsorship for someone to come over from Ireland maybe later in the year to do some teaching here. There's a couple of people interested, so we were discussing all the stuff like visas and advertising and wotnot.
Aaarrgh Jack's awake. Jack, I'm really really sorry for hijacking your thread so badly. [Imagine me cringing and looking embarrassed] LOL @ Conan - I think Beebs has had a bit of a shock coming home to 1 session a week as opposed to 3 a night!
Sorry Jack I'm doing it again. Right, serious face :-| I still think learning ITM is nothing like learning a symphony. Was that what you said?
I also think Q had some good points, expressed about as concisely as is humanly possible! For me the bit about "denying the validity of a consumer-based culture" stands out. But that's kind of nothing new or anything is it? I mean, Jack, you're a hippy, you must relate to all that stuff!
I may be a hippy, but learning ITM can still be like memorizing an entire symphony -- one tune at a time, rather than doing orgami while I drive my car to a Dead concert.
By the way, before anyone who looks at this thread gets completely the wrong idea: *I am fully aware of how silly my first paragraph on this thread sounds*. It's meant to sound like that because I'm a silly person. Just so you know. *Dow passes out on sofa*
Forget what I said earlier. Learning ITM is actually like learning to play badminton.
Firstly, you can play it by yourself. Some people think you can only play either by yourself if you're really fast, but if you're good then you can do it quite elegantly on your own too. This takes lots of practice. But really it's best if there's more than one person, cos other players give you funny looks if you try to play on your own.
Then, in both, you hold this thing in your hand(s), and traditionally it's made out of wood although polymers are gaining popularity in both too.
In both, there's a net (except in ITM, where there isn't. Badminton's more like trapeze in this regard).
And in both you hit things: in badminton it's that weird-ass ball thing, and in ITM it's the bodhran player.
And also, people come to watch you if you're really good. Like in the Olympics. But most people, when you tell them that that's what you do a lot of, they just sort of look at you funny.
When I was first learning to play ITM, I played guitar with a fiddler friend. It was very similar to time I spent with another dear friend who was a fantastic motorcyclist. We would ride together on the twisty roads of southern Indiana, he would set the pace and the basic rhythm, the road was the melody, and we ran along as smoothly as we could, together. I loved that and I love playing ITM.
Later, when I started to play with sessions, it felt different because every session plays the tunes differently, and while the tunes remain the same, listening to and the variations that folks in different places play is wonderful!
Having learned symphonies, I would say Jack has a point, but so does Mark. The two experiences have parallels, but also significant differences. It's hard to describe a complex process succinctly.
The way I'd put it, having thought about this all morning as I inventoried office supplies --- :p --- is that learning ITM is like sitting and watching a creek (brook, stream, whatever the term is where you are) flow over a lot of rocks and eyots and things. You watch the water and see all of the different textures in it, and as you watch you start understanding what they are and how they happen and why they happen. Then suddenly you find yourself inside how the stream works and you know exactly how each bit of the water is flowing the way it does. That's what learning music feels like to me.
But then I work next door to a magnificent creek, and I spend my break time watching the water flow. So the metaphor comes easily to mind. Although I've always thought of music as being like water, as well as being like spoken language.
Right. Nuff o that. Back to work. Thanks for the short vacation, Jack. ;)
Sara
... making love in a hammock. It's fairly simple to patch your way through with sloppy and sometimes painfully embarrassing (or just plain painful) results, but takes a fair amount of practice, skill, and talent to get a satisfactory end product.
Well, Jack, I've seen bits of tennis player John Mcenroe's game what've been called a public performance, and tennis is kinda like badminton (without the ITM influence), so logically the answer must be...
lol, Celtic1234, thats exactly right. yeah, i knwo, i'm a whole half page off, well o well. i sometimes practice my scales... not much tho. i didnt know them until this year and i've been playing for 7 years... and have had many tests on them in school. my new goal is to play every scale at reckless ITM-player fast speeds in every interval. so far i'm on C in 1s, 2nds, 3ds, 4ths, and working on 5ths. i have a long way to go to get all 96 scales for major!
Heh, Conan - I think I may actually owe you about 4 bottles of Champagne!! What are you on about anyways you chancer!!?? You can drink with the best of them
I did a pubic perfrormance once that didn't seem as much like a symphony sounds as how it feels. There was a traditional feel to it, but it wasn't just Irish.WB
It's the high touch in high tech/high touch, mentioned over 20 years in Megatrends by John Naisbett. It's the perfect antidote to a life spent in toil to the machine, to the drudgery of daily domestic life, where one appears on a regular basis at the door of a run-down building smelling of smoke, beer, and old wood, where the rats run underneath and overhead, and the trains rumble by, and the rain beats like a drum on the old tin roof, and the girl with the brown hair dances in the corner, belly ring visible, and the empty pints litter the floor, and you can't take your eyes off the bare feet of the lovely female fiddler next to you, and you fantasize about running off to Dublin with her, and you get up to pee and to get another pint of the used motor oil lovingly called Guinness, and it's like you forgot all the shit you call life, the deferred dreams, the girls you used to know, the bills, the car repairs, the demands of a six-year old child, and you crank through another set of tunes with people you know all too well, or some you don't even know, even though you've drank and pissed and strummed with them for four or five years, and it's like entering a dream world of foggy nights, woolen Aran sweaters, and the dream of Celtic tribes, and old bicycles, and peat fires, rocky coasts, and ancient myths, and girls with silver brooches in their hair, and long knives in leather pouches, and you once ruled a land fair, with cold, clear springs, deep forests, rich bogs, and full of fairies, spirits, and bards, harpists, and poets...
Jack, that's stream of concscience writing, aided by a glass of champagne (big professional triumph yesterday). Life is good, but those of us who traded some of our dreams for stability and domestic tranquility may recognize some of my imagery. Don't you?
The description of the tin-roofed, well-ratted building is a local pub where the magic happens. It's a bit run-down (heh heh), but it's got loads of character, and the Guinness is expertly poured by the magnificent Kelly the Barman, or by any one of several intriguing and lovely bar lasses.
Your conscience writes backwards, Stevie? Heh -- anyone else read The Last Hero, by Terry Pratchett? It's a mark of good saga writing, according to Ghengis Cohen the Barbarian, that talking backwards thing, a "land fair" or "maiden fair", and no one ever just talks, they always "spake", which is also backward, because it's never "he spake up" but "up spake he"...
The Irish are, 'spaking' in generalizations, the most poetic people on the face of the earth (although they never considered themselves to be "Celtic" until they were given that linguistic designation, along with the other "Celtic" peoples who never considered themselves part of some vast "Celtic" tribe, by a linguistic Welshman in the mid-1700's, I think it was, or maybe it was the mid-1800's, I mis-remembering be...), that is, until you start talking poetically at them, and then they look at you as if you've sprouted two heads, because they can't be having with all that airy-fairy nonsense...
But congrats on your triumph of yesterday, whatever it was.
I don't pretend to be a writer, and I'm not trying to talk nonsense to the Irish. I claim a bit of poetic license here. However, I've tromped through ring forts and other structures in Aran and Clare, the holy wells of Sligo, the square castle of Keats, spent hours in the National Museum in Dublin studying the Iron Age artifacts, and I'm working my way through an Irish history book now.
It's easy to spin off into the ditch of shallow Anglo romanticism concerning the Celts, but it's just as easy to get hung up on endless arguments and quips over a nation and its culture you're aren't a citizen of.
It's just a bit of bad poetry, eh? But just to make everyone happy, I'll cease and desist.
I read a book back in high school that said that most communication happens outside of words. That's why politicians and lobbyists (I work in the government in a government town) don't conduct all their business online.
Frankly, it's hard to tell the difference online, and I'm really sensitive to offending anyone Irish by my love of their culture and music. I always think of Japanese bluegrass bands when I'm playing ITM, so I try to have a sense of what I'm doing and why, instead of just whanging away musically or verbally.
Quickly, no, Stevie, you didn't screw up, we're just teasing you. Or at least, I am. Mark and Jack were probably very very serious, she said with a straight face.
*smirk*
The skin of a rhino should be cultivated by all folk who hang out at sessions. Although it should also be noted that often there's a point to slagging. Of course, usually the Irish are stunned that you could possibly have taken them seriously when they're in slagging mode.
How's that for something to make you feel paranoid? *grin* Gotta go, I really am late!
Ooh dry-roasted, my fave! Hey Q, if I stand down here on the stage and open my mouth, see if you can hit it with one of your peanuts. I've got a big mouth y'know, me.
We have fun and tease at our local sessions, but some of our players have been attending for a long time, and it's like one big, happy, completely dysfunctional family. This guy hates that couple, that girl can't stand that guy, etc. And then there's the musical slights. A couple of years ago, an unhappy small bunch of players spun off into a group called The Outer Ring. There was a similar earlier group with a very self-deprecating name I've forgotten. They apparently didn't feel welcome, although I suspect they just couldn't keep up with the tunes and the tempos.
We've got a few folks who regularly participate who would probably stick it in pretty deep sometimes if they had an opportunity (and of course, we would tell them to stick it in again!). They'd smile all the way too. Maybe flack jackets instead of rhino skin?
There's always a point to slagging. You just have to know where the tip of the blade is and how long it is.
At first it feels quite strange and may indeed be harmful, but it is habit forming (although you tend to only do it with other people who appreciate it). Once you have mastered it, you can move on to drinking through your nose (or learning to play the pipes.)
hahahaha... I definately never looked at it quite like that greenie.
Stevie, for the record -- I WAS slagging you. I actually enjoyed your "stream of concscience writing." And as far as the "Outer Ring" gang is concerned -- if there's enough sessions to go to, everyone can be in the inner ring. Sessions don't have to always be dog piles. I like 5-7 people myself.
Thanks, Jack. I've got the slagging thing down, I think. Just for the record, my little piece does not reference anyone in particular. As the saying goes, all characters and situations are fictional.
Every time I put my six-year old daughter to sleep in her room upstairs, we play a little game. She sits on the potty for a bit (so Mommy and Daddy don't have to get up in the middle of the night to help her go potty), and after she washes her hands, she turns off the light and come running fast into the room, and jumps up on the other bed where I've been resting and waiting for her to finish. She always wants a story, and I usually abide her with some tale of a canoeing or camping trip I took in college. (I probably spent more time outdoors than in classes during my second year.) We cuddle for a while, and then it's time to climb into her bed and turn off the light.
One night late, I simply said to her "Once upon a time, they lived happily forever." We laughed at the absurdity of such a short story.
Learning ITM is like:
Learning ITM is like:
Learning ITM is like: memorizing an entire symphony, with all it's various movements -- one tune at a time.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Phantom Button
Re: Learning ITM is like:
no, because in a symphany there is an order for the parts. in ITM there isnt.
ITM is like learning a bunch of tunes without relying on music (perhaps in learning, but not in playing), and ultimately learning how to play these tunes with a group of either friends or even strangers and create music. of course, true ITM would be playing by yourself, but thats not the way people do it nowadays as much.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by daiv
Re: Learning ITM is like:
I didn't say you had to keep it all in the same order. But it is like a huge body of work with many different parts. Much of it sounds like variations of other parts, and there are many different rhythms and tempos. And I never suggested it couldn't be shared among friends.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Phantom Button
Re: Learning ITM is like:
yeah, i could see that. one giant, never ending symphony.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by daiv
Re: Learning ITM is like:
word!
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Phantom Button
Re: Learning ITM is like:
What? Aren't we allowed to argue with you anymore?
I don't think it's like memorising an entire symphony at all. Entire symphonies are obviously far more harmonically and melodically complex. The whole structure of each fragment of melody in a symphony bears little resemblance to the form of an Irish tune. A conductor has to memorise entire symphonies and know what instruments are playing what at any one time. For a conductor, what's happening at any one time is open to a greater range of interpretation than trad in terms of dynamics. You're going to be much more concerned with timbre, texture and volume than anyone would be in a session, or anyone concerned with learning the trad repertoire. An orchestra playing a symphony simply is not like a bunch of people getting together for tunes.
Learning trad for me is a whole different experience from learning classical music, like the difference between learning how to ride a bike and how to drive a car. They're both vehicles of sorts, which allow you to avoid walking, but you have to think about different things. Like with a bike you have to think more about balance, otherwise you fall over. With a car, you have to learn how to use the clutch, otherwise you stall.
Learning trad is a weird hobby for obsessed people. It's like stamp-collecting, only you're collecting tunes. Or it's like being interested in learning the dates of every single monarch that has ruled a country. You're never going to learn them all, but you learn them one at a time. Sometimes they stick and you can remember them easily. Sometimes they flit away annoyingly. Either way, if you tell a lay person that you can do this, they're going to go "so?".. You can tell a non-tradist that you just learnt a new tune, and they'd probably look at you listlessly, thinking "it's great that you've got a hobby, but why would you want to do it?"
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Dow
Re: Learning ITM is like:
i was just trying to not be argumentative about a metaphor that really has no real right or wrong interpretation of.
i personally think it is very different, but then again... i also think that learning trad is a great use of my time, so what do i know? :p
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by daiv
Re: Learning ITM is like:
In fact, forget the monarch thing, it's like learning origami. Each model you make has a character of its own. For each model you have a series of folds - some are complex, some not. Th model as a whole looks better when it's finished if you've been careful and made sure to crease the paper thoroughly and accurately. You can memorise how to make each thing, or you can use instructions in a book (like sightreading dots). It makes a good party trick and people think you're kinda cool but a bit weird for being good at it. You can socialise with other people who are obsessed with origami. All this skilled arty stuff is similar really from a learning point of view. But symphonies are a different ball game.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Dow
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Ah no, Daiv - I was directing that at Jack, not you.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Dow
Re: Learning ITM is like:
hi jack! couldn't get in here for awhile (jeremy?) but was intrigued by your heading: Larnin' ITM is Like....?"
well, i agree. When I get on a new tune it is very encompassing for me as well. My knowledge and experience thus far present themselves to me in a new way when I am in learning mode, and something "symphonic" happens. It is sweet and delicious. But, as you know experience teaches that this euphoria is largely subjective.....
fine days, them days of wanderlust and innocence
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by vboyd100
Re: Learning ITM is like:
As a metaphor, well, hmmm, yeah, like you say there's no right or wrong interpretation of it, but I think it's a bit of a crap one Jack
I think there are better metaphors out there... But hey, it's much more fun to disagree than be boring and just agree.
(Especially if it's Jack)
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Dow
Re: Learning ITM is like:
hmm.. i post and a whole reft of posts flood before me
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by vboyd100
Re: Learning ITM is like:
so, there is some consensus here that ITM is NOT like a symphony.. I DISAGREE>> I HEAR a SUYMPHOy.. Remember Diana Ross and the Motown Jubee joo.. they heard the layers..
Conductors of symphonies have a differnt kind of experience, thats all. Their knowledge is more technical. A single guy or gal with a single instrument commits the same amount of emotion per capita...
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by vboyd100
Re: Learning ITM is like:
more per capita maybe even
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by vboyd100
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Dow, must you always take my allegory so literally? I don’t mean it’s just-like-learning a symphony any more than you mean it‘s like driving a car. (Talk about sucky metaphor) It just occurred to me that it’s like one huge body of work -- all inter-related kind of like a symphony. Of course when I posted this thread I didn’t expect everyone to agree, but we’ll leave the argumentative aspects to you, Dow … ya nut… Brit-Box player… *snicker*
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Phantom Button
Re: Learning ITM is like:
WARNING: It would be advisable that no one use the term; "public performance" anywhere in this thread. Just so it doesn't go off the deep end. *snicker*
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Phantom Button
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Na', snothing like a symphony
If I didn't take you so seriously then we'd have nothing to discuss. It'd be like:
Jack: "A = B"
Everyone else "We agree. OK next topic!"
What'd be the bloody point in that?! (Mr. "German box player")
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Dow
Re: Learning ITM is like:
I quite like my origami metaphor. I think it's pretty well thought out actually, at least compared to the sucky symphony idea
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Dow
Re: Learning ITM is like:
ok so the private conductor while preparing his private symphony for a private performance of privately slushed political monies for the benefit of many privatized persons with secluded oceanside resorts privately perched on their personal oceanside lots with no tresspassing signs
woops i digress methinks
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by vboyd100
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Not to mention the fact that origami is done for personal pleasure. And you might go to a club or something and meet up with (and maybe drink with) other people who like origami. The whole point of a syphony is that the orchestra rehearses it for the purpose of....
a PUBLIC PERFORMANCE!!
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Dow
Re: Learning ITM is like:
vboyd: *you*, *digress*? Naahhh
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Dow
Re: Learning ITM is like:
crossposted.. what's this about the origami? Allegorys folded into metaphor? Craftime?
late night on the Pacific Rim?
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by vboyd100
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Aargh sorry gotta go, Beebs has just invited me out for a drink and I can't say no. And that's not me chickening out and saying "you're wrong, bye" - I'm not like that, you know I'm not.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Dow
Re: Learning ITM is like:
i mean, what the hell do They do in their seaside palaces anyway/ methinks they fold paper..
an' I am Dead on Topic
uhm but did i tell u about my Dad's recent trip across Canada, an'it's effect on my fsmily?
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by vboyd100
Re: Learning ITM is like:
ok, g'night, nice chattin an see ya later mark! nighE
hi beebs,, nex time mebbe...
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by vboyd100
Re: Learning ITM is like:
So for Dow - Learning ITM is like doing orgami whilst driving a car
By the way... I've seen orgami performed in public, Dow, you chicken Brit-Box player.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Phantom Button
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Learning ITM is like engaging in mnemonic excercises that rerout and possibly re-grout neural pathways and muscle memory reactors in synch with flexible but wilfully limited fractal (from mathematically interpreted and proportioned) sound systems, individually processed and produced but validated by a networked community, the emergent consensus of which informs, limits and standardises the output.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Q
Re: Learning ITM is like:
it's also like taking a radical political position on lifestyle and cultural living, denying the validity of a consumer-based culture and eschewing the principles of a market economy. It's like espousing a buy-in approach to anarcho-syndicalism, as represented by small self-governing communities that have reject hierarchies, though non-institutionalised and fluid power structures wax and wane within the group from time to time.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Q
Re: Learning ITM is like:
it's also, like, totally awesome.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Q
Re: Learning ITM is like:
No Q. What you describe is what diddly music "IS", not what it's like.
And I too have seen origami performed in public. And I thought to myself, "That should be in the back of the pub, where it belongs."
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by llig leahcim
Re: Learning ITM is like:
I was contrasting paradigms! Bloody hell, you's is a tough crowd.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Q
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Quick! Quick! somebody use some of these smileys to calm everyone down.
;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o) ;o)
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by showaddydadito
Re: Learning ITM is like:
.... being in the advanced class after cutting your teeth on Morris Tunes/English Tunes/Old Timey/etc (take your pick). It's a whole order more difficult, but a whole lot more rewarding. It makes you dedicate more of your life to it if you're serious about the music and it changes you. It is also addictive.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by paul.slater
Re: Learning ITM is like:
learning ITM is like learning to walk, you can't play(walk) but you want to, you have no interest in crawling (scales), when you do manage to walk (play) those first few steps, you do so too fast, and end up falling on your arse.
Plus it's about 10 times more frustrating. What is it about ITM that keeps me going? God only knows.....
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Celtic1234
Re: Learning ITM is like:
You guys have too much time on your hands. *snicker*
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Zina Lee
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Yellow zeens, hows it going...me n dow are online again.... aiiiieeee
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by shoddy fiddle player
Re: Learning ITM is like:
This is Dow talking as Beebs. We are getting pissed on a week night and Beebs has to go to work tomorrow and she's stressing. Imagine us hiccuping, playing really cool MP3's from Bridie's collection, and drinking beers.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by shoddy fiddle player
Re: Learning ITM is like:
BTW hijack!!!
Sorry lame joke...
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by shoddy fiddle player
Re: Learning ITM is like:
LOL -- never have to imagine that, for god's sake, it happens too often to have to use the imagination! What are you two going to drunken go on about for our amusement tonight? ;)
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Zina Lee
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Back to the original post, in regards to crawling (playing scales) Does anybody actually practise scales?
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by shoddy fiddle player
Re: Learning ITM is like:
drunkenLY...sheesh...
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Zina Lee
Re: Learning ITM is like:
I do, sometimes, Brides. Admittedly, mainly it's because Kevin Glackin told me that I should, but also sometimes when I get tired of thinking and need to relax my fingers between tunes. Or when I feel like I need to check my sense of intonation.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Zina Lee
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Zeens darls (we're playing musical chairs here and commenting on the fact that you're always just *there* on this website. It's great cuz we have someone to talk to when we're being "drunken little darlings"). You know those people who can't play a CD the whole way through? They let one track play for about 2 seconds and then they pounce on it and change the track? That's Beebs.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by shoddy fiddle player
Re: Learning ITM is like:
I dont change tracks all the time Dow! We are listening to the tune Flooded Road to Glenties by Jimmy McHugh, may in fact be the best tune ever written! Sorry about the hijack! Dow is going to post it tomorrow...Kevin G told me to do that as well - said I needed to do it (years ago) but I just cant really be bothered doing scales, its enough effort just to learn tunes.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by shoddy fiddle player
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Hmmm, was trying to say 'yalloh' like homer simpson - but it doesnt work when your trying to write it down...
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by shoddy fiddle player
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Thought I'd check my e-mail on the way to the hot tub, and then of course I had to check here...
(Guess I overdid the concentrating on the new tunes last night -- learning The Curlew and Jug of Punch -- my neck hurts this morning! Should've done more scales.
You guys aren't near drunk as usual, there's not near as many bits of punctuation as when you're really lit. Heh.
Okay, I'm going to go get some breakfast and pop into the hot tub. Then I have to come back down and motor through a bodice on a dress for a darling little dancer...she's so excited about her first solo dress!
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Zina Lee
Re: Learning ITM is like:
I love the Curlew - good one!
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by shoddy fiddle player
Re: Learning ITM is like:
You're right we're not that drunk, but we still luv you Zeens
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by shoddy fiddle player
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Not that we don't not love you when we aren't drunk, I mean don't love you, . .
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by shoddy fiddle player
Re: Learning ITM is like:
The Last two are from Dow, obviously!
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by shoddy fiddle player
Re: Learning ITM is like:
I can see beebs starting to beat herself up here in a minute 8>)
I play scales! I even admit it. Not just to check intonation and all that sort of technical thing ... when I'm tired and hassled and I know it will be no more than three semi-quavers before I get interrupted, playing scales and technical exercises keeps me at least a little bit in touch with the fiddle even if I'm prevented from getting into the tunes.
Time all the aussies were in bed, I think
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Tish
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Hey beebs, I'm learning Palmers Gate, aren't I good? 0
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Tish
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Beebs you're a dirty stop-out and a bad influence on poor wee Mark.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Conán McDonnell
Re: Learning ITM is like:
"poor wee" and "Mark", all in the same sentence?!
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Zina Lee
Re: Learning ITM is like:
*splorf*
Q, half the people I work with sound like you. Only being ex-military, they lack your sense of irony!
And so to bed ...
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Tish
Re: Learning ITM is like:
He who wrestles with the Dragon must always remember to wach out for it's tail.
Master Po
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Pied Piper
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Back home now. Zina, for a change, I was the bad influence tonight, not Beebs. She actually said at one point (and Conan will find this hilarious and know exactly what I'm talking about) "No I'm not having any more beer because you know me I'll just want more", so I bought her another pint. And predictably she then wanted to stop at the bottle shop on the way home
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Dow
Re: Learning ITM is like:
LOL -- yer a hard man, Mark.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Zina Lee
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Well otherwise I woulda had to go straight home, and she really doesn't take much persuading! Actually we were having a meeting tonight (ooh sorry Jack btw to hijack) about organising sponsorship for someone to come over from Ireland maybe later in the year to do some teaching here. There's a couple of people interested, so we were discussing all the stuff like visas and advertising and wotnot.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Dow
Re: Learning ITM is like:
haha Beebs is nothing if not consistent! Tell her I said she owes me a glass of champagne. Hope you guys had a great night.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Conán McDonnell
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Ok... now that Dow and beebs are sleeping it off... can we get back on topic? Q had some interesting points... doncha think?
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Phantom Button
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Aaarrgh Jack's awake. Jack, I'm really really sorry for hijacking your thread so badly. [Imagine me cringing and looking embarrassed] LOL @ Conan - I think Beebs has had a bit of a shock coming home to 1 session a week as opposed to 3 a night!
Sorry Jack I'm doing it again. Right, serious face :-| I still think learning ITM is nothing like learning a symphony. Was that what you said?
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Dow
Re: Learning ITM is like:
I also think Q had some good points, expressed about as concisely as is humanly possible! For me the bit about "denying the validity of a consumer-based culture" stands out. But that's kind of nothing new or anything is it? I mean, Jack, you're a hippy, you must relate to all that stuff!
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Dow
Re: Learning ITM is like:
I may be a hippy, but learning ITM can still be like memorizing an entire symphony -- one tune at a time, rather than doing orgami while I drive my car to a Dead concert.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Phantom Button
Re: Learning ITM is like:
By the way, before anyone who looks at this thread gets completely the wrong idea: *I am fully aware of how silly my first paragraph on this thread sounds*. It's meant to sound like that because I'm a silly person. Just so you know. *Dow passes out on sofa*
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Dow
Re: Learning ITM is like:
It's way to late for disclaimers about lame posts you made long ago, Dow... uh.... Dow? ............ yo... hello?
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Phantom Button
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Forget what I said earlier. Learning ITM is actually like learning to play badminton.
Firstly, you can play it by yourself. Some people think you can only play either by yourself if you're really fast, but if you're good then you can do it quite elegantly on your own too. This takes lots of practice. But really it's best if there's more than one person, cos other players give you funny looks if you try to play on your own.
Then, in both, you hold this thing in your hand(s), and traditionally it's made out of wood although polymers are gaining popularity in both too.
In both, there's a net (except in ITM, where there isn't. Badminton's more like trapeze in this regard).
And in both you hit things: in badminton it's that weird-ass ball thing, and in ITM it's the bodhran player.
And also, people come to watch you if you're really good. Like in the Olympics. But most people, when you tell them that that's what you do a lot of, they just sort of look at you funny.
And both are really fun if you've been drinking.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Q
Re: Learning ITM is like:
We *are* still talking about music here, right?
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Zina Lee
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Yes. And badminton.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Q
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Q... that was brilliant. hahahahaha But I have one question: Is badminton a public performance?
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Phantom Button
Re: Learning ITM is like:
When I was first learning to play ITM, I played guitar with a fiddler friend. It was very similar to time I spent with another dear friend who was a fantastic motorcyclist. We would ride together on the twisty roads of southern Indiana, he would set the pace and the basic rhythm, the road was the melody, and we ran along as smoothly as we could, together. I loved that and I love playing ITM.
Later, when I started to play with sessions, it felt different because every session plays the tunes differently, and while the tunes remain the same, listening to and the variations that folks in different places play is wonderful!
stv
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by stv culchie
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Having learned symphonies, I would say Jack has a point, but so does Mark. The two experiences have parallels, but also significant differences. It's hard to describe a complex process succinctly.
The way I'd put it, having thought about this all morning as I inventoried office supplies --- :p --- is that learning ITM is like sitting and watching a creek (brook, stream, whatever the term is where you are) flow over a lot of rocks and eyots and things. You watch the water and see all of the different textures in it, and as you watch you start understanding what they are and how they happen and why they happen. Then suddenly you find yourself inside how the stream works and you know exactly how each bit of the water is flowing the way it does. That's what learning music feels like to me.
But then I work next door to a magnificent creek, and I spend my break time watching the water flow. So the metaphor comes easily to mind. Although I've always thought of music as being like water, as well as being like spoken language.
Right. Nuff o that. Back to work. Thanks for the short vacation, Jack. ;)
Sara
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by sara g
Re: Learning ITM is like:
... making love in a hammock. It's fairly simple to patch your way through with sloppy and sometimes painfully embarrassing (or just plain painful) results, but takes a fair amount of practice, skill, and talent to get a satisfactory end product.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by pakooper
Re: Learning ITM is like:
I don't want to know how you know that, pakooper.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Zina Lee
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Well, Jack, I've seen bits of tennis player John Mcenroe's game what've been called a public performance, and tennis is kinda like badminton (without the ITM influence), so logically the answer must be...
sort of.
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Q
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Only sometimes when it isn't, of course, and only sometimes when it is...
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by Zina Lee
Re: Learning ITM is like:
lol, Celtic1234, thats exactly right. yeah, i knwo, i'm a whole half page off, well o well. i sometimes practice my scales... not much tho. i didnt know them until this year and i've been playing for 7 years... and have had many tests on them in school. my new goal is to play every scale at reckless ITM-player fast speeds in every interval. so far i'm on C in 1s, 2nds, 3ds, 4ths, and working on 5ths. i have a long way to go to get all 96 scales for major!
# Posted on August 24th 2004 by daiv
Re: Learning ITM is like:
A really bad addiction. You cannot stop until you get that one tune just right.
It's half 12, and I am not going to bed until I get Siuil a Run on the dulcimer.
# Posted on August 25th 2004 by TheSilverSpear
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Heh, Conan - I think I may actually owe you about 4 bottles of Champagne!! What are you on about anyways you chancer!!?? You can drink with the best of them
# Posted on August 25th 2004 by shoddy fiddle player
Re: Learning ITM is like:
I did a pubic perfrormance once that didn't seem as much like a symphony sounds as how it feels. There was a traditional feel to it, but it wasn't just Irish.WB
# Posted on August 25th 2004 by windybaer
Re: Learning ITM is like:
It's the high touch in high tech/high touch, mentioned over 20 years in Megatrends by John Naisbett. It's the perfect antidote to a life spent in toil to the machine, to the drudgery of daily domestic life, where one appears on a regular basis at the door of a run-down building smelling of smoke, beer, and old wood, where the rats run underneath and overhead, and the trains rumble by, and the rain beats like a drum on the old tin roof, and the girl with the brown hair dances in the corner, belly ring visible, and the empty pints litter the floor, and you can't take your eyes off the bare feet of the lovely female fiddler next to you, and you fantasize about running off to Dublin with her, and you get up to pee and to get another pint of the used motor oil lovingly called Guinness, and it's like you forgot all the shit you call life, the deferred dreams, the girls you used to know, the bills, the car repairs, the demands of a six-year old child, and you crank through another set of tunes with people you know all too well, or some you don't even know, even though you've drank and pissed and strummed with them for four or five years, and it's like entering a dream world of foggy nights, woolen Aran sweaters, and the dream of Celtic tribes, and old bicycles, and peat fires, rocky coasts, and ancient myths, and girls with silver brooches in their hair, and long knives in leather pouches, and you once ruled a land fair, with cold, clear springs, deep forests, rich bogs, and full of fairies, spirits, and bards, harpists, and poets...
# Posted on August 26th 2004 by Audeamus
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Are you comfortable Stevie? Wait a sec... (Gets out note pad sets timer for $100 per hr and puts on a pair of glasses) go on...
# Posted on August 26th 2004 by Phantom Button
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Jack, that's stream of concscience writing, aided by a glass of champagne (big professional triumph yesterday). Life is good, but those of us who traded some of our dreams for stability and domestic tranquility may recognize some of my imagery. Don't you?
The description of the tin-roofed, well-ratted building is a local pub where the magic happens. It's a bit run-down (heh heh), but it's got loads of character, and the Guinness is expertly poured by the magnificent Kelly the Barman, or by any one of several intriguing and lovely bar lasses.
# Posted on August 26th 2004 by Audeamus
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Stevie you should be writing scripts for films like Human Traffic.
# Posted on August 26th 2004 by Dow
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Your conscience writes backwards, Stevie? Heh -- anyone else read The Last Hero, by Terry Pratchett? It's a mark of good saga writing, according to Ghengis Cohen the Barbarian, that talking backwards thing, a "land fair" or "maiden fair", and no one ever just talks, they always "spake", which is also backward, because it's never "he spake up" but "up spake he"...
The Irish are, 'spaking' in generalizations, the most poetic people on the face of the earth (although they never considered themselves to be "Celtic" until they were given that linguistic designation, along with the other "Celtic" peoples who never considered themselves part of some vast "Celtic" tribe, by a linguistic Welshman in the mid-1700's, I think it was, or maybe it was the mid-1800's, I mis-remembering be...), that is, until you start talking poetically at them, and then they look at you as if you've sprouted two heads, because they can't be having with all that airy-fairy nonsense...
But congrats on your triumph of yesterday, whatever it was.
# Posted on August 26th 2004 by Zina Lee
Re: Learning ITM is like:
I don't pretend to be a writer, and I'm not trying to talk nonsense to the Irish. I claim a bit of poetic license here. However, I've tromped through ring forts and other structures in Aran and Clare, the holy wells of Sligo, the square castle of Keats, spent hours in the National Museum in Dublin studying the Iron Age artifacts, and I'm working my way through an Irish history book now.
It's easy to spin off into the ditch of shallow Anglo romanticism concerning the Celts, but it's just as easy to get hung up on endless arguments and quips over a nation and its culture you're aren't a citizen of.
It's just a bit of bad poetry, eh? But just to make everyone happy, I'll cease and desist.
# Posted on August 26th 2004 by Audeamus
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Ever heard of "slagging", Steve? It's a sign that people like you.
# Posted on August 26th 2004 by Zina Lee
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Zina, are you criticizing me? Leave me aloooone!
# Posted on August 26th 2004 by Dow
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Yah, boo, sucks to be you! *smirk* (That was at Mark, not you, Stevie...)
# Posted on August 26th 2004 by Zina Lee
Re: Learning ITM is like:
You didn't finish your sentence Zeens. It's a sign that people like you do what?
# Posted on August 26th 2004 by Dow
Re: Learning ITM is like:
I read a book back in high school that said that most communication happens outside of words. That's why politicians and lobbyists (I work in the government in a government town) don't conduct all their business online.
Frankly, it's hard to tell the difference online, and I'm really sensitive to offending anyone Irish by my love of their culture and music. I always think of Japanese bluegrass bands when I'm playing ITM, so I try to have a sense of what I'm doing and why, instead of just whanging away musically or verbally.
So, I didn't screw up here?
# Posted on August 26th 2004 by Audeamus
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Ha, bl**dy ha, Mark! No time to bicker with you this morning, I'm late to teach class! Byyyyyyyeee!
# Posted on August 26th 2004 by Zina Lee
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Course not, silly.
You just woke up the peanut gallery!
*yawn*
*rubs eyes*
*stretch*
# Posted on August 26th 2004 by Q
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Quickly, no, Stevie, you didn't screw up, we're just teasing you. Or at least, I am. Mark and Jack were probably very very serious, she said with a straight face.
*smirk*
The skin of a rhino should be cultivated by all folk who hang out at sessions. Although it should also be noted that often there's a point to slagging. Of course, usually the Irish are stunned that you could possibly have taken them seriously when they're in slagging mode.
How's that for something to make you feel paranoid? *grin* Gotta go, I really am late!
# Posted on August 26th 2004 by Zina Lee
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Ooh dry-roasted, my fave! Hey Q, if I stand down here on the stage and open my mouth, see if you can hit it with one of your peanuts. I've got a big mouth y'know, me.
# Posted on August 26th 2004 by Dow
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Careful, Dow - you might wake up the coconut gallery %7b
# Posted on August 26th 2004 by Q
Re: Learning ITM is like:
We have fun and tease at our local sessions, but some of our players have been attending for a long time, and it's like one big, happy, completely dysfunctional family. This guy hates that couple, that girl can't stand that guy, etc. And then there's the musical slights. A couple of years ago, an unhappy small bunch of players spun off into a group called The Outer Ring. There was a similar earlier group with a very self-deprecating name I've forgotten. They apparently didn't feel welcome, although I suspect they just couldn't keep up with the tunes and the tempos.
We've got a few folks who regularly participate who would probably stick it in pretty deep sometimes if they had an opportunity (and of course, we would tell them to stick it in again!). They'd smile all the way too. Maybe flack jackets instead of rhino skin?
There's always a point to slagging. You just have to know where the tip of the blade is and how long it is.
# Posted on August 26th 2004 by Audeamus
Re: Learning ITM is like:
...gargling vodka whilst standing on your head.
At first it feels quite strange and may indeed be harmful, but it is habit forming (although you tend to only do it with other people who appreciate it). Once you have mastered it, you can move on to drinking through your nose (or learning to play the pipes.)
# Posted on August 27th 2004 by Greenwiggle
Re: Learning ITM is like:
hahahaha... I definately never looked at it quite like that greenie.
Stevie, for the record -- I WAS slagging you. I actually enjoyed your "stream of concscience writing." And as far as the "Outer Ring" gang is concerned -- if there's enough sessions to go to, everyone can be in the inner ring. Sessions don't have to always be dog piles. I like 5-7 people myself.
# Posted on August 27th 2004 by Phantom Button
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Hahahaha
# Posted on August 27th 2004 by Phantom Button
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Wow. I'd consider that a promotion. The Brothers should celebrate.
# Posted on August 27th 2004 by Dow
Re: Learning ITM is like:
The English could take over from the anglos when there's a change of key in the set, just to help them out.
# Posted on August 27th 2004 by Dow
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Thanks, Jack. I've got the slagging thing down, I think. Just for the record, my little piece does not reference anyone in particular. As the saying goes, all characters and situations are fictional.
# Posted on August 27th 2004 by Audeamus
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Keep writing Stevie... I'm waiting for your next piece.
# Posted on August 27th 2004 by Phantom Button
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Every time I put my six-year old daughter to sleep in her room upstairs, we play a little game. She sits on the potty for a bit (so Mommy and Daddy don't have to get up in the middle of the night to help her go potty), and after she washes her hands, she turns off the light and come running fast into the room, and jumps up on the other bed where I've been resting and waiting for her to finish. She always wants a story, and I usually abide her with some tale of a canoeing or camping trip I took in college. (I probably spent more time outdoors than in classes during my second year.) We cuddle for a while, and then it's time to climb into her bed and turn off the light.
One night late, I simply said to her "Once upon a time, they lived happily forever." We laughed at the absurdity of such a short story.
She loves ITM too.
# Posted on August 27th 2004 by Audeamus
Re: Learning ITM is like:
Nice one Stevie. Sounds like you've adjusted very well to the life for which your dreams were deferred.
# Posted on August 27th 2004 by Phantom Button
Re: Learning ITM is like:
There are compensations...
# Posted on August 27th 2004 by Audeamus